What does the vocabulary of 2 Peter indicate about its authorship?"Considering the brevity of the letter, this is markedly disproportionate" - I think we need to consider not only the number of unique words by length of text, but also by author - ie if Paul wrote twice as much you wouldn't expect the number of unique words to double but perhaps even to go down as he's basically going to be using his normal vocabulary again.

Why is the observation that “it was good” missing on the second day?You are welcome :) The reason why I don't feel comfortable with any other division than 'day' is that the one unbroken pattern in the entire account is the day completion formula "and there was evening and there was morning the X day". To my way of thinking (constrained by this logic), the 'waters' (the 'arena' for the sea creatures) are already complete at the end of day 2. The action of gathering the waters together does not complete that creation, but begins the creation of the 'land' arena in preparation for the animals and ultimately humans on day 6.

What is the new covenant made with Jews/Israel in Jeremiah 31:31@ScottS at least three of the five questions (and perhaps all five) could be separate questions in their own right - and they are independent enough that there seems no need to bundle them into one question even if they all arise from the same verse. What advantage do you see in having all the questions rolled into one here?

Oct24

comment

Meaning of στοιχεῖον (stoicheion)This looks like it might be interesting but is very hard to follow because of the lack of formatting. Can you add some structure like paragraphs, headings, conclusion etc as appropriate?

Oct20

comment

Omission of 'fasting' in Mark 9:29I'm not sure which I prefer (and I've loved learning from all three answers here) - but I personally have accidents in the 'plausible' category, not just 'possible'. It's a big body of text, and other accidental scribal errors are well-know to have occurred (eg character substitution) - omission of a few words is probably less common, but not implausible for my money.

Oct20

comment

Omission of 'fasting' in Mark 9:29If I'm understanding you correctly, you are saying that (for example) "A scribe sneezing, and resuming at the wrong spot, is of course possible", but that while possible, it is not plausible, is that right? If so, I guess that is a judgement call we'll all have to make for ourselves :)

Oct20

comment

Omission of 'fasting' in Mark 9:29Yes, they are classes, but my point in referencing the list is merely that duplication and transposition are types of "addition" with implicit explanation, whereas there is no need to subdivide "omission" into types, because any omission is already plausible (and the kind like this that results in a verse that still makes sense is the kind that is most likely to survive subsequent copying).

Omission of 'fasting' in Mark 9:29If we judge a question by it's answers, this one is great. Three excellent answers already that don't agree but are fascinating and informative and all have my upvote.

Oct17

comment

Which Greek NT passage has proven to have the most variant readings?We might mean the same thing but I see a 'shopping' question as one lending itself to multiple answers rather than one desiring multiple answers, if that makes sense. Either way, your extensions to the question will, I think, make multiple answers very unlikely so I've rescinded my vtc. Hope you get a good answer :)